


Introspection

by InnocentBystander



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-08
Updated: 2014-02-08
Packaged: 2018-01-11 14:09:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1173996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InnocentBystander/pseuds/InnocentBystander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What do you do with an eternity, a godlike knowledge, and perfect memory of your past mistakes?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Introspection

Eternity is a long time, Eridan realized as he sat leisurely on a love-seat in the purple expanse of his mind.  
He'd been in the shared expanse with Sol for a long time before he'd found this place. When he and Sol were first trapped in their shared husk of a body, there really wasn't much for them to do. The child they were with was an idiot, and what little sadistic pleasure that could be gained from insulting it repeatedly had already been lost, they couldn't seem to talk to each other without fighting, and learning how to function as two separate trolls in one sprite at the same time was infuriating mainly for the above reasons until they had worked out a system of one controlling the movement while the other controlled speech.  
This left Eridan and Sollux, alone, without anything to do whatsoever except think.

The constant boredom had really been a sort of blessing, as it had given them a lot of time to dwell on their past lives and mistakes, without risk of interruption. They found that after a few hours of meditation, they would open their eyes and find themselves inside a long plain where a rich purple stretched in one direction, and a vibrant yellow stretched toward the other. Where he and Sol had stood however, the two colors met and clashed violently, as if a large, vibrant, and constantly changing skirmish was taking place between the rival colors.

It took hours after that for the idea that they were actually inside their sprites mind and that the battleground represented the conflict between the two of their consciousness' in one body dawned upon them. At this discovery, Eridan had immediately set off into the purple side of the plain which he interpreted as his.  
After walking, for what he perceived as hours, Eridan stopped.

He could no longer discern where the center of the field was located and for the most part, didn't give a fuck. On a hunch, Eridan had imagined a purple love-seat in the middle of the plain, one of his favorite spots inside his old hive.

When he had opened his eyes, the very same chair appeared before his eyes. Eridan had stared awhile before being seated on the purple cushions, considering the implications.

Coming to the present, Eridan considered the seat beneath, him as he had when it had first been conjured. It was a place where he had plotted and thought of the awful deeds he could have, and would have done if not for Fef and his other friends.....

At the thought of Fef, Eridan felt his heart go tight with pain and loss as his eyes brimmed with bitter tears. She was the thing he regretted more than anything he'd ever done, more than how he treated others when he was younger, more than blinding Sollux, more than killing Kanaya, even more than destroying the entire future of his race. Although he regretted these actions, killing Feferi had had the most profound effect on him and his choices.  
Eridan slammed his fist against the padded arm of his seat in a sudden, helpless fit of anger.

He should've been a better friend, a better troll! Should've been able to convey how much he had relied, no, needed her as his compass. It didn't even need to be in a romantic relationship, Hell, didn't even have to be Fef. So long as he had someone, something, to keep him from accomplishing the hateful urges his high blood and station gave him.

Of course, it was expected of him as a sea troll. It was how he was raised, brought up.

The landwellers are lesser than us. They are dirty, hated, and if we did not rule them, the world would plunge into chaos. Yet like Fef, Eridan didn't hate them. But at least she understood what being royalty really meant, and refused to allow others to change how she thought despite the expectations of her position. Eridan had attempted to get the best of both ideas, to profit off of conforming to the ideals of the nobility while harboring a strange secret fascination with the land. Because he had to do what was expected of his station, right? He had to hate all the landwellers and to want to destroy them. For what reason would they do that? He had occasionally thought in passing. Is it because they're different? How? Why? Eridan never asked, because of his hunger and greed for power, he'd never asked what the point of the rivalry was. But he still couldn't get the possibility that the hatred really was pointless out of his head.

So he faked it.

He created a shell of hate, to keep his strange acceptance and, dare he even think it, fascination secret from everyone. He drew up battle plans, sought weapons of mass destruction, and began building an army, all to hide his "forbidden" interest in an unfamiliar people.

This was the main reason he was always trying to find someone to fill his quadrants, someone to give him structure. It was failsafe of sorts. In case all the odds stacked against him fail, and he almost succeeds in his mission. He'd always had someone to keep him from fully wiping the lowbloods out. Of course this failsafe could never be attained when he was younger, when he most needed the support, mainly because he was an absolute stubborn git.

Eridan chuckled under his breath at this thought, as well as the try hard he'd been. Funny now that he was looking back on his actions, but not so much when looking forward.

He had been an inordinate scumbag, who could not stand being different or considered unclean by those around him. He, who was too afraid to contend with the status quo, who, instead of attempting to fight the political normal for what he believed was right, constructed a shell to distance him from friends in an effort to fight his loathed empathy with them, who instead of trying to deal with his problems, tried to lose himself in a different world under a different name. Instead of doing all these things, he had forced Fef to bear his burden, to pick up his slack. He had given up his responsibilities as an individual and her friend, and made her pull his weight. Why? It was because he was too terrified, too selfish to bear it himself, because he was a fool. He was a blind fool that allowed others to control how he thought of things and what he defined as "normal".

Looking back on it now, Eridan wondered how he could have possibly been so blind to everything. He had ignored the manipulation, blatant in hindsight, to cultivate a social rift between the sea-trolls and the landwellers. He disregarded the so called "nobility" who were so afraid of losing their power, that they created system that operates by fear and hate based on blood color, to keep the psychically attuned from learning the power they wielded. So much, that though the landwellers possessed the numbers to successfully rebel against the crown, they were so oppressed that they wouldn’t.

Eridan leaned his cheek against his fist, supported by the arm only to find that it was wet. He'd been crying without even realizing it.  
Eridan giggled in a sound that was half laugh, half sob.

He hadn't cried in sweeps. It was a reminder that he was still capable of empathy, even if it was for himself. It was nice to know that he was still sane, that all he'd been through and done had not yet broken him.

Of course, now it wasn't just his memories Eridan was punished with. With the original combining of their personalities, he and Sollux both had access to all of their memories and thoughts until they learned to block each other out.

It was then, that Eridan had fully felt the sheer hatred and disgust that he had garnered in the eyes of the others. He had suspected, but always had his ego to hide behind. Now, he could no longer hide from the fact, or conjure up justification for his actions. There was nowhere to run from wave after seemingly endless wave of pain.

That was what got to him.

The knowledge, that most if not all of the position he was in was all of his own making. That in trying to help himself, he ended up shattering the majority of his own sanity as well as harming others. There had to be some sort of ironic phrase that coupled with the situation. One of the human children's sayings. How did it go? "Being tossed enough string to kill yourself?"

Doesn't matter, Eridan supposed. Nothing mattered anymore.

The bleak wave of despair and misery that had begun to sweep over Eridan finally consumed his seated form. He wished he could draw his mind away from the memory and responsibility like a hand from a hot fire, but he couldn't. He could feel the weight, pulling him inexorably closer as if it were a black hole of the worst possible emotions. He felt as it settled like a blanket of molten lead around him as he felt silent tears flow down the high bones of his cheeks.  
And so he remained. A lonely sentinel, on a purple chair, in a purple field, locked in a bleak nightmare of his own design.


End file.
